Texas Algebraic Geometry Symposium


Texas A&M University 5 – 7 April 2024.

Abstracts

 

 
 
  TEXAS A&M UNIVERSITY
College of Arts 
& Sciences
Chiara Damiolini  A gentle introduction to Conformal Blocks
Spaces of conformal blocks are naturally constructed starting from a geometric datum (a projective curve with some marked point) and a representation-theoretic input (a vertex algebra V and some V-modules). Varying the geometric data, these conformal blocks define sheaves on the moduli space of curves which satisfy particularly nice combinatorial and functorial properties. In tonight's talk I will give a gentle introduction to these objects. No prior knowledge of vertex algebras or moduli of curves will be required.

Giorgio Ottaviani  The Hessian Map
The Hessian map is the rational map associating to each homogeneous polynomial in r+1 variables its Hessian, which is the determinant of its Hessian matrix. Gordan and Noether proved in 1876 that the Hessian map is not defined exactly on cones for r≤3 and provided examples of polynomials in more variables with vanishing Hessian which are not cones. The Hessian map is equivariant for the action of SL(r+1), we briefly discuss the invariant-theoretical point of view. An interesting open problem is if the Hessian map is birational on its image. We discuss this problem and we expose some results obtained jointly with Ciliberto.

Juanita Duque-Rosero  Local heights on hyperelliptic curves for quadratic Chabauty
The method of quadratic Chabauty is a powerful tool to determine the set of rational points on curves. A key input for this method is the values of local height functions. In this talk, we will discuss an algorithm to compute these local heights at odd primes v not equal to p for hyperelliptic curves. We will also explore examples of how this work extends the reach of quadratic Chabauty to curves previously deemed inaccessible. This is joint work with Alexander Betts, Sachi Hashimoto, and Pim Spelier.

Pierrick Bousseau  The KSBA moduli space of log Calabi-Yau surfaces
The KSBA moduli space, introduced by Kollár, Shepherd-Barron, and Alexeev, is a natural generalization of the moduli space of stable curves to higher dimensions. It parametrizes stable pairs (X,B), where X is a projective algebraic variety satisfying certain conditions and B is a divisor such that KX+B is ample. This moduli space is described concretely only in a handful of situations: for instance, if X is a toric variety and B=D+\epsilon C, where D is the toric boundary divisor and C is an ample divisor, it is shown by Alexeev that the KSBA moduli space is a toric variety. Generally, given a log Calabi-Yau variety (X,D) consisting of a projective variety X and a maximal anticanonical divisor D and an ample divisor C on X, it was conjectured by Hacking, Keel, and Yu that the KSBA moduli space of stable pairs (X, DC) is still toric (up to passing to a finite cover). In joint work with Alexeev and Arguz (arXiv:2402.15117), we prove this conjecture for all log Calabi-Yau surfaces. This uses tools from the minimal model program, log smooth deformation theory and mirror symmetry.

Hannah Larson  Cohomology of moduli spaces of curves
The moduli space Mg of genus g curves (or Riemann surfaces) is a central object of study in algebraic geometry. Its cohomology is important in many fields. For example, the cohomology of Mg is the same as the cohomology of the mapping class group, and is also related to spaces of modular forms. Using its properties as a moduli space, Mumford defined a distinguished subring of the cohomology of Mg called the tautological ring. The definition of the tautological ring was later extended to the compactification Mg-bar and the moduli spaces with marked points Mg,n-bar. While the full cohomology ring of Mg,n-bar is quite mysterious, the tautological subring is relatively well understood, and conjecturally completely understood. In this talk, I will ask the question: which cohomology groups Hk(Mg,n-bar) are tautological? And when they are not, how can we better understand them? This is joint work with Samir Canning and Sam Payne.

Maria Fox  Ekedahl-Oort and Newton Stratifications
We will discuss two important invariants of abelian varieties in characteristic p: the p-torsion subgroup and the p-divisible group. Given a moduli space ℳ of abelian varieties in characteristic p, these two invariants can each be used to create a stratification of ℳ. We will see in several concrete examples that these two stratifications are very different, reflecting the fact that these two invariants capture very different attributes of the abelian varieties. The new result in this talk is joint with D. Bhamidipati, H. Goodson, S. Groen, S. Nair, and E. Stacy.

Alicia Lamarche   Wonderful compactifications, toric varieties, and derived categories
Given a complex Lie group G of adjoint type, the wonderful compactification Y(G) (originally described by work of DeConcini-Procesi) is a compactification of G by a divisor with simple normal crossings. These groups are specified by their Dynkin diagrams and corresponding root systems, from which one can construct a toric variety X(G). In this talk, we will discuss ongoing work with Aaron Bertram that aims to succinctly describe the derived category of coherent sheaves of Y(G) and X(G).

David Eisenbud  Looking inside infinite resolutions
Hand computation of even a few steps in an infinite minimal resolution is very slow, but with systems such as Macaulay2 one can make many experiments leading to observations that I find surprising. Some have become theorems, others are quite mysterious. In this talk I'll describe some of the new phenomena that I and others have seen, and some of the guesses (conjectures?) that we have made. The new results are part of joint work with Hai Long Dao, Bernd Ulrich, Claudia Polini and others.